Engineering for Versatility, Not Resilience

When we analyse the gaps in our supply chain operations, it isn’t just about how wide the differences are in how we’re performing versus what we’re aiming for.  It won’t only be about variances between targeted & actual results, but it will also be about how well we respond to and handle risks now and in the future. 

Gaps, in the supply chain engineering context, are the disparities between the ideal and the present states of the structures & systems of our operations.  Gaps represent the differences between the performances we want to achieve versus how we are currently doing. Gaps are the obstructions, divides, and barriers that stand in our way toward our ultimate objectives.

Adversities are dangers, perils, hazards, threats, and menaces that cause disruption (if not disaster) to our operations.  Risks are the possibilities these adversities manifest themselves as unwelcome outcomes.  Emphasis is on the word, possibilities.  We’re never sure how and when risks will become adversities.  We just know they can and will eventually. 

Many so-called experts push for resiliency as the answer to mitigating risk and minimising the effects of adversities.  In supply chain management (as per SAP), resiliency is “the ability to respond quickly to operational disruptions through flexible contingency planning and forecasting – from material sourcing to logistics and the final delivery of products and services.”

Resiliency, however, is more of a buzzword than it is a desired attribute.  It stresses responsiveness via “flexible planning and forecasting.” When it comes to reducing risk and adversity, we need to be more than responsive and flexible.  We need to not only bounce back from disruption, but we also need to counteract, if not avoid, risk.  It’s not resilience which we need, but versatility. 

Versatility denotes our supply chain’s readiness to transform itself as the need arises.  Versatility is the means to change whatever we’re doing such that we uphold & continue our track record of operational performance.  Versatility is not only flexibility or the ability to switch or adjust; agility, the speed to make any change; and adaptability, the range of operability under different circumstances.  It’s not only about coping, which is what resiliency means, but more of engineering our operations to be versatile. 

Versatility is about solving problems before they become looming threats. 

In 2005, then United States President George H. W. Bush asked his cabinet secretaries to plan for a possible pandemic.  President Bush felt that the American government was not prepared to handle a pandemic like the influenza outbreak of 1918. 

The Bush administration laid out proposals to stock up on medicines and develop protocols to respond to a pandemic threat.  Bush’s then Secretary of Homeland Security, Ms. Fran Townsend, recapped:

“Thus was born the nation’s most comprehensive pandemic plan — a playbook that included diagrams for a global early warning system, funding to develop new, rapid vaccine technology, and a robust national stockpile of critical supplies, such as face masks and ventilators.”

Unfortunately, even though President Bush’s cabinet secretaries initiated steps to make the plan a reality:

“…large swaths of the ambitious plan were either not fully realized or entirely shelved as other priorities and crises took hold. 

Efforts to sustain the pandemic plan waned under succeeding US presidents. 

When CoVID-19 arrived in America in 2020, the Trump administration referred to the 2005 Bush plan to respond to the threat.  The US government sped the development & distribution of mRNA vaccines in record time, which likely saved lives and mitigated the coronavirus pandemic’s economic impact.  It wasn’t a grand success but thanks to a former president’s forward thinking in 2005, the worst of the 2020 coronavirus was blunted.

The Bush administration’s pandemic plan was remarkable in that it was a “playbook,” which stressed “a global early warning system,” development of a “new, rapid vaccine technology,” and “robust national stockpile of critical supplies.”

The doctrine of the Bush plan was about responding to a pandemic threat via attacking the pathogens that would be causing it.  It was about organising people and resources to solve problems.  It wasn’t about preparing the government to be resilient, e.g,, locking down the country, but to be versatile, e.g., being forewarned  about the threat before it arrives, studying what it is, & developing countermeasures via pre-planned medicine & vaccine protocols. 

Gaps in supply chain operational performance include how we deal with risks.  Risks are possible, if not probable, adversities—perils, menaces, barriers, divides, & obstacles—which would disrupt our plans. 

So-called experts preach resiliency as the answer to mitigating risk.  But it’s not enough.  What we need more is versatility, the ability to flex, adapt, and be agile as the need arises.  It’s about addressing the root causes and fixing them in our operations. 

To be versatile isn’t about just being ready to respond or hunker down but instead be organised to solve whatever problems that are the root causes of the adversities awaiting us. 

Engineering supply chains is about solving problems, not enduring them. 

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